Beware of the infected ... and your fellow humans

Rating: 8/10 (11 January 2018)

While this film didn't exactly reinvent the zombie horror genre, director Danny Boyle and writer Alex Garland nonetheless still manage to bring a feeling of jarring intimacy and immediacy to the standard premise by wisely focusing on a small handful of survivors who try to stay alive and retain residual traces of their humanity in an extremely dire and desperate situation. Indeed, Boyle and Garland handle the premise with admirable take-no-prisoners grim seriousness by showing in stark and chilling terms how easily people can degenerate into a horrible barbaric state in the wake of civilization collapsing. In an inspired cynical touch, a group of soldiers turn out to be anything but heroic and helpful as they prove to be more concerned with their own self-preservation over helping others out.
Cillian Murphy makes for an engaging average guy protagonist as the fundamentally decent Jim, Noamie Harris provides plenty of spark as the sassy and ruthlessly determined Selena, Brandon Gleeson does typically fine work as affable cab driver Frank, and Christopher Eccleston likewise excels as the steely Major Henry West. A tense sequence in a tunnel rates as a definite harrowing highlight while the shots of a dead quiet and empty London are quite eerie and striking. Anthony Dod Mantle's rough digital cinematography gives this picture a gritty sense of documentary-style realism. But it's the way this film manages to keep things on a basic human level which in turn makes the horror presented herein so potent and unsettling.